Parshat Matos-Masei: Forty Years of Schooling

Rabbi David Zeller z”l was born to a Reform Jewish family in the United States. His search for spirituality brought him to India where he lived as a Sadhu, an ascetic who lives without material possessions. Zeller’s insights and experiences in India ultimately brought him back to Judaism and he became an Orthodox Rabbi who lived in Israel until his untimely death. The processes that he underwent in India and in his journey back to Judaism, detailed in his autobiography, “The Soul of the Story,” have striking parallels to life of the Jewish people during the forty years in the desert.